Last night, my two nine-year-old sons and I headed up to Chicago to catch the opening night of Serj Tankian’s new solo tour. My boys and I are huge Serj and System of a Down fans and so we decided to catch the show.

Tom Morello’s solo act, called The Nightwatchman, was the opener. I am a huge Rage Against the Machine fan, so I was expecting great things from Tom. Unfortunately, his show was mediocre at best. His set started with his elderly mother introducing him to the audience, while wearing a Nightwatchman t-shirt. It went downhill from there. He spent thirty to forty minutes trying to sound like Johnny Cash, while regurgitating his typical left-wing extremist message. To be honest, his show bored the hell out of us (constant talk of George Bush being the “king of hell” and that he should be impeached).

After they took Tom’s crap off the stage, the show became everything that we could ever ask for. Serj and his band took the stage; all dressed in tuxedos with top hats, and started with The Unthinking Majority. The crowd went wild and people were moshing and crowd surfing in no time. It was odd not being in the middle of that mess!

Serj and his new band just tore it up! Larry LaLonde (Primus) played lead guitar, so it was great to see Larry play outside of Primus. I was not familiar with the other members, but they were of equal talent. Overall, Serj was very pleased with the Chicago crowd. You could tell that he was overwhelmed by the response from the audience. Between talking about “how fucking awesome" we were, he spent time talking about politics and the world in general, but unlike Tom Morello, his message actually had some substance.

This tour is only hitting a few major markets. Those of you near them should check this out. This was one of the best shows that I have seen in a long time.

Here are the set lists:

[B]The Nightwatchman[/B]

One Man Revolution
Union Song
King of Hell
The Road I Must Travel
Flesh Shapes the Day
Guerilla Radio (Rage Against the Machine cover)
This Land is Your Land (Woody Guthrie cover) – Yes, he actually played this song.